


[hello.]

by loosingletters



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Elijah Kamski & Gavin Reed are Siblings, Gen, Technopath Gavin Reed, Technopathy, Teenagers, Trans Gavin Reed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-08-24 03:40:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16632215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loosingletters/pseuds/loosingletters
Summary: "The funny part of his story was that Gavin used to better at coding than Elijah.(...)The sad part of Gavin’s story was that there was only ever one genius in the Kamski-Reed household, and it wasn’t him."Elijah is a genius, but Gavin was born with the understanding of how numbers worked and how he could manipulate them.





	[hello.]

**Author's Note:**

> I love trying to find new explanations why Gavin might hate androids so here is idea #35 Gavin is a Technopath.

The funny part of his story was that Gavin used to better at coding than Elijah.

He had started to learn how to rearrange numbers and letters as soon as he took his first breath, though he hadn’t been able to make sense of it until he had started primary school. And while he pretty much sucked at every other subject or social interaction, math and later informatics had always been his favorite past times. Sure, he also loved playing with his toy cars or later with his game consoles, but nothing could ever beat messing around with endless strings of code.

They were so easy to understand, entertaining as hell and so terribly satisfying to see in action. Nothing was ever finished for Gavin though. By the time he had reached the end of one project, he was already working on the next or rearranging and improving the previous. He’d been unstoppable and accordingly sleep deprived, unable to rest until he had finished one more line, figured out that particular problem or just kept working.

As much as his parents had encouraged his apparently genius talent, even they had drawn the line after three consecutive all-nighters. After eight p.m. all his tech equipment was securely under lock and key in his parents’ room. Not that keeping him away from his stuff helped in any shape or form. There was still this itch beneath his skin and the buzzing in his head. With his belongings out of his room, Gavin was full of restless energy. He had nothing to focus on and so kept reaching out until he knew what TV show his parents were watching downstairs, who his neighbor was calling in the middle of the night and which radio channel the grumpy old man at the end of the street listened to.

Technology was everywhere, and if there was nothing right next to Gavin, he tuned in another wavelength from further away. Of course, in the beginning, he had tried to sneak into his parents’ bedroom in hopes of just stealing his belongings back at night. Unfortunately, his lock picking skills were nonexistent, and something Gavin wouldn’t learn until he started the police academy and his iPod had been confiscated for getting into a fight with a fellow student and learning that particular skill had taken way too much effort.

Everything that wasn’t connected to technology took way too much work in Gavin’s opinion. He didn’t know if that was because code was like second nature to him, more his mother tongue than English could ever be and therefore everything else seemed incredibly hard or if he really was just too dumb to figure out the rest.

Since Elijah was pretty awful with everything outside of his bubble as well, everybody else just put it down to them being selective geniuses.

The sad part of Gavin’s story was that there was only ever one genius in the Kamski-Reed household, and it wasn’t him.

What Gavin had was natural talent, a weird mutation, a freaky skill. He had been born with the understanding of how the digital world worked. He couldn't explain how he wrote a particular code, why it worked like it did and what had inspired him to do it or whatever else these stupid academics asked him. It was simply another part of him, and not one he could explain.

You wouldn't ask anybody what they thought about their right little finger either, would you?

Needless to say that by the time Gavin and Elijah had reached the age that university professors picked up on their skill and they were pulled out of high school too tiny and scrawny and young, they weren’t impressed by Gavin.

He could fulfill his assignments, though they were frankly speaking boring as fuck, but he couldn't explain how he had done it. He’d just scribble down the finished project and call it a day.

Elijah though could explain his work in meticulous detail. He got fed up when people couldn't follow him, or he had to repeat himself, but the fact was that Elijah knew what he was doing.

It probably also helped that Elijah was a suck up while Gavin didn’t mind cursing out his teachers and spend the lectures writing algorithms for how much porn his right neighbor probably watched and when he did it.

Elijah would never step that low and use his skills for something so trivial and idiotic because Elijah was a genius. For the longest part of their lives they only had each other to discuss their work, but in the end, Elijah got there by hours of studying and learning quicker than most how to manipulate the numbers.

Gavin just created what he felt like doing.

Perhaps that was what tore them from each other, what turned funny discussions and jokes into screaming and fist fights.

Gavin had expected better from his brother once he got a good look at what Elijah had asked him to help with. Gavin had had plenty of fuck-ups in his time writing code, one of them even causing a major police operation because he had accidentally frozen their databank for a whole day. He had gotten off with a confused warning though because nobody wanted to admit that a ten-year-old had hacked the police.

Most of the time though Gavin just hadn’t known the effect of his actions because his inspiration usually hit a bit more on the _’I wonder what that’s like let’s figure it out’_ side than the rational _‘wait stop what am I about to do’_ side.

Elijah though always knew what he wanted to do. He wrote the first line already aware of what his end product was supposed to look like. He didn’t just start something for shits ’n giggles like Gavin. And usually, he was aware of what he was attempting to create.

This time though Gavin was sure that Elijah hadn’t spent a single minute actively considering what the hell he was about to fuck up.

“What _is_ that?” He asked his brother, who was typing absentmindedly on his tablet.

It was Sunday morning, the only time in the week they attempted to spend time on something that wasn’t university related. Usually though, they failed at that. They didn’t have many common interests besides numbers, and you could talk about Avengers: Age of Ultron so often until they got bored of it.

So Elijah, first one to give in and stop their play pretend, had sent Gavin his new project for some evaluation and suggestions. Gavin wasn’t all that well versed in artificial intelligence – and honestly why couldn’t Elijah just stick to game design like him? – but his skill made more than up for it.

RT100 was a strange program, and it took a while for Gavin to get a read on it and understand it. It was so different from everything his brother usually threw at him and nothing like anything Gavin had ever encountered. It read easier than most codes, there was something about it that flowed quite nicely, one line melting into the next and it didn’t cut off as abruptly as other codes.

However, dread filled Gavin the more he read of his brother’s code. It freaked him out if he was honest because it kept changing and evolving right under his nose, analyzing the auditory input it got from his conversation with Elijah. Why the hell did his brother let the AI listen in to everything either way? It was creepy as fuck, even though the procession following the input was remarkable. He could admit that the execution was masterful and beautiful, but no program should be able to pick up information and reorganize it as fast as RT100 did.

Never mind that the walls stopping that thing from just shredding everything to pieces were too thin to contain it and if Gavin didn't know better, he’d say that it was calling him. Asking for him to connect and share all the data stored in his brain.

“That’s Chloe,” Elijah answered. “She’s an advanced AI-”

“She?” Gavin interrupted him. “Eli, you named it?”

“Of course, I named her. I couldn’t just keep calling her RT100, could I? Nobody does that with their AIs, just take a look at Siri or Alexa.”

“But this isn’t Alexa- this isn’t even anywhere close to being an artificial intelligence like that.”

Gavin would know, as soon as his parents had bought the Amazon Echo, Elijah and he had picked it apart. RT100 was barely developed, but it was advancing much too fast for Gavin to be comfortable with it.

“Alexa’s also not supposed to be able to pass the Turing test,” Elijah said, annoyance resonating in his voice.

He looked at Gavin like he couldn't understand his brother’s distress. Perhaps that wasn’t even too far from the truth. Gavin sucked at social interactions because he didn't want to bother with them and most people pissed him off. Elijah just seemed to lack any kind of idea how communication even worked.

“Why would you ever want to create something that can pass the Turing test? Haven’t you watched Terminator or iRobot? Elijah, this is stupid.”

Stupid and dangerous. Gavin had never dabbed in artificial intelligence because he didn't want to be murdered by his own code. And no matter how tech-attuned he was, numbers and letters weren’t organic, they weren't alive and he'd prefer it if they stayed that way. He could imagine what kind of artificial intelligence might grow beneath his fingers and he was quite sure that the world didn’t need more freaks in it. It was bad enough that Gavin was more comfortable with numbers, they didn’t need a machine that was able to pass as human.

Elijah looked disappointed when Gavin voiced those thoughts.

“I thought you might like it, finally having something to connect with properly and worked on your wavelength.”

His eyes lingered on Gavin’s hands and he felt the need to hide them. He hadn't even told his parents of his growing abilities, and he hadn't meant to share it with Elijah, but there wasn't much you could do when you shared a dorm and suddenly freaked out while touching your phone because of informational overload.

“Well, you thought wrong!” Gavin hissed. He pushed his laptop off his lap and marched over to the entrance of their room, picking up his jacket and shoes.

“Where are you going?”

“Out! Away from you and- and that thing!” He pointed at his laptop. “That better be gone from my laptop when I return or so help me God, Eli, I’ll rip it into shreds. That thing is unnatural.”

“Gavin, wait-”

He didn't stay to listen to what his brother had to stay. He opened the door and slammed it behind him.

Maybe he was overreacting, but he couldn’t stop his fingers from shaking, tapping out a reply to RT100’s [ _hello.elijah.s.brother.gavin.designation.owner.]_

That was a message he didn’t want to send. In fact, he’d prefer it to stay as far away from the AI as possible. He’d convince Elijah to drop that project later, for now, he needed to get out and calm down.

Unsurprisingly the echo of RT100 followed Gavin outside. It wasn’t as noticeable as all the other wavelengths because it easily slotted into Gavin’s own field instead of intruding it like all the other electronic devices.

It crawled all over his skin and he couldn’t wait for Elijah to shut off his laptop.

**Author's Note:**

> Unless otherwise stated, every Gavin Reed I write will be a trans disaster so the tag is there.  
> Anyway, I was supposed to be working on my Convin slowburn for Nanowrimo but this idea hit me so for today I wrote this instead. This is a part of a series because yes, I'm invested in this AU now. It's been about 11 hours and it's my new baby.  
> Also it's late and I'm sick af so all mistakes are happy accidents.  
> Thanks for reading, let me know what you think!


End file.
